Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Key Takeaways
forrester.com
Table Of Contents
2 Knowledge Management Critical For
Effortless Engagement
4 Zero In On Vendors With The Right Vertical
Focus And Track Record
12 Answer Four Questions To Narrow The
Vendor Field
13 Profiles Of Five Knowledge Management
Vendor Solution Categories
Recommendations
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can troubleshoot via content that is proactively pushed to the small screen on a device, as well as
accessible via a PC or mobile phone. If self-service fails, they can escalate via a phone call or chat
to a tech support experts who can remotely diagnose and fix issues.
Lenovo uses social knowledge to increase reach. Lenovo, a Chinese multinational computer
hardware company, uses Lithium Technologies for its community platform which is tied to its
tribal knowledge base. They identify superfans company advocates and incentivize them
to manage their community, which includes tagging threads as accepted solutions which are
promoted to the knowledge base. These community-generated solutions helped reduce US
support calls by 20% in the first year of operation. Superfans are also trusted with pinpointing new
questions from social media streams and translating and publishing content which extends the
reach of Lenovos web self-service.
Singtel Optus uses knowledge management to increase web self-service. Singtel Optus, an
Australian telecom company, uses the [24]7 Virtual Agent solution in conjunction with a knowledge
base for all customer interaction channels web, customer portal, search, mobile, Facebook
including its 5,000 phone and chat agents. Customers and agents ask over 20 million questions per
year. The system has transformed their customer contact model in the first year of operation the
percentage of customers contacting Optus online compared to live agent channels increased from
16% to over 65%, and the handle time of agents using [24]7 Virtual Agent was reduced by 10%.
Zuora uses knowledge to drive customer engagement and ultimately renewal rates. Zuora, a
US-based subscription billing provider, struggled to provide web self-service beyond mere support.
They now use MindTouch to deliver knowledge relevant to the stage in the customer journey
including sales and onboarding to drive product adoption and decrease churn. Zuora structures
knowledge to encourage customers to learn how to use the product, instead of simply providing
a fix. Increased customer engagement moved Zuoras NPS by 20 points, increased site traffic by
nearly 100% year-over-year, with 55% of traffic driven by their self-service site.
CabinetParts.com uses knowledge to increase conversion and revenue. CabinetParts.com,
a US hardware supplier, found that their highly qualified reps who are ex- handymen and builders,
spent too much time fielding repetitive questions instead of focusing on giving professional
advice or helping shoppers build their carts. The company now uses web self-service and agent
knowledge from nanorep to provide contextual answers. They use real-time text analytics to
address most frequent unanswered questions. Prospects using web self-service are three times
more likely to convert; and also realized a 30% decrease of agent time spent on repetitive issues.
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Decrease
Decre
operational
erationa
costs
Improve
compliance
Standardize answers
Comply with company policies
Comply with regulatory policy
Improve
customer
satisfaction
Drive revenue
Increase reach
Improve engagement
Decrease customer churn
Increase conversion
Zero In On Vendors With The Right Vertical Focus And Track Record
When choosing a knowledge management vendor, the first questions you should ask relate to the
vendors background and high-level focus areas. Ask questions about its vertical focus, its success
in a particular vertical, the size of deployment that the vendor is most comfortable supporting, the
supported deployment options, typical knowledge management scenarios that the vendor supports
(agent-facing, web and/or mobile self-service or both), and customer references (see Figure 2).
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FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise
Vendor
name
Number of
Average
Largest
knowledge knowledge knowledge
customers deployment deployment
size (number (number of
of agents)
agents)
Main usage
scenarios
Is knowledge
typically
purchased
separately or
standalone?
400
200
200,000
Agent-facing (65%);
agent- and customerfacing (35%)
Standalone (100%)
Lithium
150
N/A
N/A
Agent-facing (20%);
customer-facing (80%)
Integrated (100%)
Aptean
Forrester
estimates
500
150
Oracle
(Knowledge)
Forrester
Forrester
estimates
estimates
approx. 300 2,000 seats
RightAnswers 475
500
Approx.
2,000
Agent-facing (50%);
Standalone (90%);
customer-facing (20%); integrated solution (10%)
agent- and customerfacing (30%)
Approx.
35,000
Agent-facing (50%);
customer-facing (2%);
agent- and customerfacing (48%)
8,000
Standalone (100%)
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FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise (Cont.)
Vendor
name
Vertical
focus
Deployment
options
Knowledge customer
example
Software- Managed
Onas-a-service services premises
Social knowledge management vendors
Bloomfire
Technology, finance,
healthcare, manufacturing,
retail, franchise
Lithium
Telecommunications (40%);
high-tech (30%); financial
services (20%); retail (10%)
Aptean
Oracle
(Knowledge)
Concentrated focus in
B2C financial services
(banking, insurance) and
telcos, B2B and B2C
high-tech with complex
products and services
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FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise (Cont.)
Vendor
name
Number of
Average
Largest
knowledge knowledge knowledge
customers deployment deployment
size (number (number of
of agents)
agents)
Main usage
scenarios
Is knowledge
typically
purchased
separately or
standalone?
[24]7
470
200
5,000
Customer-facing
(50%); agent- and
customer-facing (50%)
Astute
Solutions
100
200
300
Standalone (50%);
Agent-facing (20%);
customer-facing (60%); integrated solution (50%)
agent- and customerfacing (20%)
Creative
Virtual
45
150
250
Agent-facing (20%);
Standalone (50%);
customer-facing (70%); integrated solution (50%)
agent- and customerfacing (10%)
nanorep
250
50
500
Agent-facing (5%);
Standalone (80%);
customer-facing (93%); integrated (20%)
agent- and customerfacing (2%)
Transversal
100
250
2,000
Agent-facing (10%);
Standalone (100%)
customer-facing (60%);
agent- and customerfacing (30%)
MindTouch
300
N/A
20,000
Customer-facing
Standalone (100%)
(includes authenticated
customer) (100%)
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FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise (Cont.)
Vendor
name
Vertical
focus
Deployment
options
Knowledge customer
example
Software- Managed
Onas-a-service services premises
Online engagement vendors
[24]7
Concentration in financial
services, utilities, retail,
and telecommunications
Astute
Solutions
Creative
Virtual
Autodesk, JPMorgan
Chase, IHG (International
Hotels Group), RSPCA,
Time Warner Cable
nanorep
Transversal
MindTouch
Technology (70%);
manufacturing (15%);
services (15%)
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FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise (Cont.)
Vendor
name
Number of
Average
Largest
knowledge knowledge knowledge
customers deployment deployment
size (number (number of
of agents)
agents)
Main usage
scenarios
Is knowledge
typically
purchased
separately or
standalone?
650
1,600
20,000
Agent-facing (50%);
Standalone (60%);
customer-facing (20%); integrated solution (40%)
agent- and customerfacing (30%)
Microsoft
(Parature)
372
Forrester
estimates
<50
100,000
Agent-facing (5%);
customer-facing (5%);
agent- and customerfacing (90%)
Standalone (15%);
integrated solution (85%)
Moxie
200
400
10,000
Agent-facing (75%);
customer-facing (5%);
agent- and customerfacing (20%)
Standalone (71%);
integrated solution (29%)
Oracle
(Service
Cloud)
2,000 to
Agent-facing (20%);
Standalone (20%);
10,000 seats customer-facing (30%); integrated solution (80%)
agent- and customerfacing (50%)
Salesforce
Forrester
estimates
9,000
Forrester
estimates
100
10,000
Agent-facing (40%);
Standalone (25%);
customer-facing (10%); integrated solution (75%)
agent- and customerfacing (50%)
Zendesk
20,000
24
1,000
Agent-facing (25%);
Integrated solution
customer-facing (50%); (100%)
agent- and customerfacing (25%)
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FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise (Cont.)
Vendor
name
Vertical
focus
Deployment
options
Knowledge customer
example
Software- Managed
Onas-a-service services premises
Omnichannel customer service vendors
eGain
Microsoft
(Parature)
Concentration in retail,
software tech, financial
services, telecommunications, public sector
Moxie
Oracle
(Service
Cloud)
Concentrated focus in
consumer brands, financial
services, telecommunications, travel, retail, and
hospitality
Beachbody, Jackson
Hewitt, Orbitz, Tok&Stok
Salesforce
Zendesk
Ask.com, nTelos
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10
FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise (Cont.)
Vendor
name
Number of
Average
Largest
knowledge knowledge knowledge
customers deployment deployment
size (number (number of
of agents)
agents)
Main usage
scenarios
Is knowledge
typically
purchased
separately or
standalone?
1,000
1,500
Verint
Integrated solution
(100%)
130,000
Agent-facing (15%);
customer-facing (15%);
agent- and customerfacing (70%)
Forrester
estimates
approx.
80,000
Integrated (>90%)
Forrester estimates:
agent-facing (60%);
customer-facing (20%);
agent- and customerfacing (20%)
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11
FIGURE 2 Eighteen Knowledge Management Vendors Offer A Range Of Uses And Vertical Expertise (Cont.)
Vendor
name
Vertical
focus
Deployment
options
Knowledge customer
example
Software- Managed
Onas-a-service services premises
Customer service process guidance vendors
Pegasystems
Verint
Concentrated focus in
financial services,
insurance, public sector,
telecommunications,
retail, and utilities
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12
Do you need proactive knowledge? Decide whether you want to focus on offering reactive
knowledge where customers or agents must search to find relevant content or whether you want
to proactively push knowledge to agents and customers based on their profile and details about
their customer service case. If contextual, proactive knowledge is part of your strategy, focus on
vendors that offer knowledge as part of an omnichannel customer service or CRM solution.
What is your knowledge philosophy? Decide how you will author and publish knowledge For
example, decide whether only a small group of knowledge workers will be responsible for authoring
and publishing, or whether certified agents or perhaps any agent will be allowed to author
knowledge, or whether customers will be able to create knowledge or flag community content to
be added to a knowledge base. Define the publishing workflows and review processes to ensure
that customer and regulatory policies are supported for your industry.
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13
Bloomfire
Company Bloomfire provides social learning, social knowledge, and sales enablement
description solutions aimed at organizing company knowledge and expertise and making it
accessible and shareable.
Knowledge product Bloomfires crowdsourced knowledge management solution provides Q&A
description functionality. Users can ask and answer questions. The historical trail of
interactions is keyword tagged, indexed, searchable, and easily updated.
Knowledge creation Via curation; user generated, including video content; or via migration from other
systems.
Knowledge Via contribution types (posts, questions), groups, communities, categories (news,
organization product, support, etc.), tags, and contributors.
Knowledge quality Via high-fives, follows, shares, and reports (e.g., engagement and content usage).
measurement and
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search. Searches return matching and related content; content
retrieval feeds based on user preferences and behavior. Also supports video search where
every word in the video is searchable.
Other vendor products Bloomfire is a standalone product. It is often integrated with CRM and content
that can be bundled management systems such as Dropbox, Box, SharePoint, etc.
with knowledge
Typical organizational Sales, marketing, customer service and support, HR
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent
Customer-facing: tiered pricing based on statistical size of website activity
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14
Lithium technologies
Company Lithium provides social software to manage social inquiries and to build and
description manage trusted community content.
Knowledge product Lithiums Tribal Knowledge Base allows customers and employees to collectively
description write, edit, and repurpose community content into knowledge articles.
Knowledge creation Via nomination of content for inclusion from the community; automatically from
accepted community solutions; via creation by community managers.
Knowledge Via customer-defined categories.
organization
Knowledge quality Via content usage reports, ratings, kudos, and gamification values. Content is
measurement and optimized via community ownership.
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search across the knowledge base and forums. Best answers are
retrieval determined by marking solutions as the accepted solution or by ratings.
Other vendor products Always bundled with the full Lithium Community Solution.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Customer service
buyer
Pricing models Pricing based on a per module add-on plus a usage model based on visits.
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15
Aptean
Company description Aptean is an enterprise application provider of ERP, CRM, and SCM
software, formed by the merger of CDC Software Corporation and
Consona Corporation in 2012.
Knowledge product description Knova is a full-featured knowledge management solution for large
customer service and support organizations, geared to the organizations
that handle complex queries across channels in industries such as hightech, telecommunications, financial services, and the IT help desk.
Knowledge creation Via authoring using templates (e.g., how-to templates); via
spidering/indexing existing external content from websites, file systems,
SharePoint, databases, and other data repositories; via agent suggestion;
or by promoting discussion threads.
Knowledge organization Via customer-created taxonomies.
Knowledge quality Via analytics (e.g., knowledge effectiveness scores, feedback ratings,
measurement and evolution document views, number of times the document solves a support
ticket/incident, and the number of times the document is linked to other
knowledge base documents); via reports (e.g., content usage, traffic
patterns, content coverage, gap, and content relevance).
Knowledge retrieval Includes keyword search; natural language search; federated search;
guided resolution and collaboration with product experts. Users can
drill into matching content by selecting words, phrases, and categories
that are meaningful to them. Also supports subscription to content, alerts
and notifications, microsites tailored to customer segments that deliver
personalized push content, user experiences, and branding.
Other vendor products that Knova is a standalone knowledge management solution but can be
can be bundled with bundled with Aptean CRM and chat.
knowledge
Typical organizational buyer Customer service and support
Pricing models Agent-facing: per named or concurrent agent
Customer-facing: per CPU core
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16
Oracle Knowledge
Company description Oracle engineers hardware and software to work together in the cloud
and in the data center.
Knowledge product description Oracle Knowledge is a full-featured knowledge base that provides
semantic search that analyzes the structure of documents during
indexing and annotates each word with related meaning based on
ontologies and dictionaries; full-fledged authoring, analytics, decision
trees, integration into CRM systems, and a web self-service reference
application.
Knowledge creation Via authoring, using a WYSIWYG editor; via import, using APIs or other
tools.
Knowledge organization Via taxonomies related to product, categories, and topic areas that can
be created standalone or synchronized with CRM products and
categories or automatically organized based on meaning.
Knowledge quality Via ratings, feedback, reports (such as search result accuracy), and
measurement and evolution reuse by agents.
Knowledge retrieval Includes keyword search; natural language search with conceptbased industry dictionaries, translated into multiple languages.
Supports federated search with built-in crawlers for web, file system, and
database. Single integrated semantic index that is also classified
(faceted) using various classification mechanisms. Supports rules-based
guided resolution flows to guide to the next action or article.
Other vendor products that can Oracle Knowledge is a standalone product. It has native integration with
be bundled with knowledge Oracle Siebel and Oracle Service Cloud and integration adapters into
other CRM solutions.
Typical organizational buyer Contact center, eBusiness, IT help desk, HR help desk
Pricing models Agent-facing: per named user
Customer-facing: per processer
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17
RightAnswers
Company description RightAnswers is a cloud-based knowledge management software vendor,
offering web self-service solutions and services for enterprise customer
service and IT support. RightAnswers also helps with content creation
and knowledge optimization.
Knowledge product description RightAnswers delivers an enterprise knowledge hub allowing all parts
of the organization to access and/or create and update knowledge.
This provides consistent knowledge to service and support teams.
Knowledge creation Via authoring; via content promotion from forums; or via import.
Knowledge organization Via collections, taxonomies, and attributes. Groups define content
access, authoring, and reviewing rights.
Knowledge quality Via reports (e.g., content authoring, usage, and quality reports) and
measurement and evolution automated content gap analysis. Knowledge is assigned a customized
quality index that is used to manage updates. It analyzes and clusters
activity and session success rates. It recommends knowledge to be
created and starts knowledge creation.
Knowledge retrieval Includes keyword search; natural language search; phrase match;
synonym search; and/or searches; and multilingual search. Supports
automatic stemming and removal of stop words; relevancy boosting
based on date range, view and usage count, or custom parameters; and
the ability to customize search relevancy. Supports federated search
(communities, websites, document management systems and
repositories). Also supports guided resolution flows.
Other vendor products that can RightAnswers is a standalone product. It delivers packaged in-line
be bundled with knowledge integrations to Salesforce, ServiceNow, SAP, Oracle, Zendesk, NetSuite,
Sugar, and Microsoft Dynamics.
Typical organizational buyer Contact center, technology management
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent
Customer-facing: two options named-user licenses with unlimited
usage or session-based (session can have multiple actions)
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18
[24]7
Company [24]7 provides cloud-based customer engagement software and services. The [24]7
description platform engages customers across web, chat, mobile, social, and phone channels
with predictive analytics, natural language, optimal channeling, and learning at scale.
Knowledge product The [24]7 IntelliResponse knowledgebase is a component of the virtual agent
description technology platform. It uses machine learning and natural language understanding
to pinpoint the intent of questions and map questions to a single correct answer.
Knowledge creation Via authoring question/answer pairs of potential customer inquiries; via training the
virtual agent, leveraging industry-specific templates, or utilizing inputs from voice of
the customer analytics.
Knowledge The client chooses how the content is organized, typically by business, channel,
organization language, etc. Organized in question/answer pairs. The product does not use
taxonomies.
Knowledge quality Via user ratings, feedback, and reports. Uses machine learning to evolve content,
measurement and which optimizes question and answer pairs. This process is managed by a business
evolution user and does not require a natural language processing expert.
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search with a predictive search
retrieval capability; federated search and guided resolutions. The knowledgebase presents
a single answer with related answers for additional information as well as the
ability to automatically display the appropriate page from the clients website.
Other vendor products Always bundled with the IntelliResponse virtual agent. Can also be bundled with
that can be bundled [24]7 predictive analytics and enterprise chat products.
with knowledge
Typical organizational Customer care, customer service, customer experience, marketing, eBusiness,
buyer and online/eCommerce
Pricing models Volume of questions answered
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19
Astute Solutions
Company Astute Solutions provides CRM solutions for B2C companies.
description
Knowledge product Astute Knowledge combines virtual agent technology, learning, and external content
description awareness to optimize content delivery. It can engage customers in an interactive
dialogue to better understand their specific needs and deliver an answer contextual
to the customer and product.
Knowledge Via authoring
creation
Knowledge Via topics
organization
Knowledge quality Via user ratings, feedback, and reports (e.g., engagement and content usage);
measurement and linguistic scoring, viewed in the authoring tool, that determines the confidence level
evolution of the response to the question posed. Machine learning identifies, summarizes, and
presents missing content topics to authors.
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search; guided resolution; and federated
retrieval search across external content such as puff, website pages, videos. Uses linguistic
and AI algorithms to determine the users intent. Search results are assigned
confidence values, and only solutions with high values are presented to the user.
Other vendor products Astute ePowerCenter CRM, Astute Social Relationship Management
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Consumer relations, marketing, eCommerce
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent
Customer-facing: tiered pricing based on statistical size of website activity
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20
Creative Virtual
Company Creative Virtual offers self-service customer and call center solutions.
description
Knowledge product V-Portal knowledge base is part of the V-Person product set and is used to manage
description content and analytics for the vendors virtual agent technology.
Knowledge Via authoring; from chat transcripts or IVR utterances
creation
Knowledge Via business, service, products, and channel
organization
Knowledge quality Via user feedback and reports (customer satisfaction, first interaction resolution,
measurement and containment, breakdown by topics, unanswered questions, etc.).
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search; federated search and guided
retrieval resolutions. Suggested answers are presented in a weighted order. Users can drill
into matching content by selecting words, phrases, and categories. Can present
sales offers based on profile or questions asked. Also has support for users
speaking their requests.
Other vendor products None. V-Person is a standalone product.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational eBusiness, call center, digital operations, innovation operations
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent per month
Customer-facing: unlimited or per conversation
Perpetual or term-based
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21
MindTouch
Company MindTouch provides knowledge-driven self-service software that converts printed
description and PDF user guides, product and support documents into micro-content,
delivering them over the web, via mobile, contextually, within a product, or via CRM
channels that helps drive pre- and post-purchase customer engagement.
Knowledge product MindTouch knowledge management solution, primarily used customer-facing, uses
description machine learning to optimize the organization, content, and relevance of
search results.
Knowledge Via authoring; via import; or captured from case notes from support channels.
creation Authors can collaboratively create and update content.
Knowledge Via a hierarchical content structure or a taxonomy structure. Users can use free-text
organization tags and also include controlled vocabulary tags (classifications). The content
dynamically generates the site navigation. Machine learning optimizes the
organization into related topic clusters and learning paths based on user and
agent behavior.
Knowledge quality Via user ratings, feedback, and reports (e.g., quality, aging, search, user history, user
measurement and contributions, site history, site activity, and popular page reports). Optimized via
evolution machine learning which promotes or flags suboptimal content.
Knowledge Includes keyword search and natural language search, including weighted search
retrieval results. Also supports guided resolution where the decision tree interface is based
on the site framework and categorization of content. Content cannot be federated.
Other vendor products MindTouch is a standalone product. MindTouch has packaged integrations with
that can be bundled Salesforce Service Cloud, Sales Cloud, Community Cloud, SAP, ServiceNow
with knowledge Zendesk, and Oracle.
Typical organizational Customer service, customer success, product management
buyer
Pricing models Based on sessions or HelpRequests
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22
nanorep
Company Nanorep offers a digital customer assistant that surfaces contextual knowledge
description for customers and agents across touchpoints and channels.
Knowledge product The nanorep knowledge base delivers different content (answers, multimedia,
description articles, troubleshooting guides, and more) for different populations or use cases,
dynamically adapting to both support and user context in real time. It semantically
analyzes questions and weights words and phrasing to understand the meaning by
the context in which it is asked.
Knowledge Via automatic collection of agent responses; via bulk import.
creation
Knowledge Via natural-language, context-driven, hierarchical labeling.
organization
Knowledge quality Via ratings, feedback, reports, and correlation between content and escalations
measurement and and/or other business KPIs like conversion. Content is optimized via: 1) reporting of
evolution most-used content, searches, feedback, and interactions to detect content gaps or
suboptimal content; the system automatically groups different phrasing of the
same question into one request and prioritizes by volume and impact; 2) automated
learnings from live-agent escalations; and 3) automated voice of the customer
inputs.
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search with semantic analysis to match
retrieval questions to answers. Supports reactive and proactive content display. Supports
spelling detection and correction, predictive completion of user query based on
NLP statistical analysis of user behavior and context. Also supports guided
resolutions and automated dialogues where nanorep queries the user for missing
contextual details. The contextual dialogue detects when a question has multiple
answers in more than one context and prompts the user to make a selection.
Contextual knowledge can be delivered proactively at different customer journey
points (for example, return policy at the shopping cart). Guided flows (as overlays)
can be triggered for specific questions used to guide the consumer within the
mobile app or across the website pages.
Other vendor products Can be bundled with nanoreps ticketing solution
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Contact center, customer service, customer experience
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent or per usage
Customer-facing: usage-based (based on traffic) or based on degree of
personalization configured
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23
Transversal
Company Transversal provides knowledge solutions for the contact center, for web self-service,
description and for the enterprise aimed at increasing employee engagement.
Knowledge product Transversal knowledge leverages Bayesian algorithms and machine learning to
description interpret the intent of questions, answer them automatically, and learn from
interactions.
Knowledge Via authoring, including videos and images; via social media monitoring to
creation automatically cluster, analyze, and suggest content to be authored in real time.
Knowledge Via automatic categorization. The knowledgebase is self-learning and automatically
organization analyzes and categorizes the semantic structure of new content.
Knowledge quality Via configurable publication workflows that ensure accuracy and tone guidelines
measurement and are met during publication, reporting, and customer feedback. Content is optimized
evolution by self-learning algorithms based on successful interactions and enhanced with
social media monitoring capabilities that recommend new solutions.
Knowledge Includes keyword search and natural language search. Machine learning
retrieval understands meaning of words and how they connect to form concepts. This allows
Transversal to match questions in natural language with the right content. Also
supports guided resolutions that are interactive process wizards to dialogue with a
customer. Returned answers are surrounded with dynamic pieces of content related
to self-service inquiries such as smart links, product promotions, service alerts, and
troubleshooting wizards. These can be intentionally configured to enrich the
experience and to predict the next question.
Other vendor products Transversal is a standalone knowledge base.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Customer support, eBusiness
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent (discounts for part-time agents)
Customer-facing: B2C: by session block; B2B: by number of employees
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24
eGain
Company eGain provides comprehensive customer engagement capabilities over a broad set
description of communication channels and touchpoints that include voice, self-service,
digital, and social channels.
Knowledge product eGains knowledge management solution is a core component of its customer
description engagement hub suite and provides consistent knowledge across channels and
touchpoints. It combines a broad set of knowledge access methods such as
federated search and process guidance behind a single search box to simplify
user experiences.
Knowledge Via authoring; translation; importing content; or crowdsourcing content from forums,
creation blogs, and social networks.
Knowledge Via folders and articles.
organization
Knowledge quality Via usage and engagement reports that flag content gaps and poor-performing
measurement and content; via user feedback; via scheduled expiration dates.
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search; intent-based search; natural language search; topic tree
retrieval browsing; faceted navigation; and guided help via case-based reasoning. Supports
federated search across websites, community, and social content. Search results
include best bet answers. Uses learning to tune the search engine. Also supports
weighted search results.
Other vendor products Can be bundled with all of eGains products: eGain email, chat, mobile, case
that can be bundled manager, social, etc.
with knowledge
Typical organizational Contact center, customer service, customer experience, eBusiness
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent
Customer-facing: per session
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25
Microsoft
Company Parature from Microsoft is a customer service and support solution. Parature offers
description a customer portal, self-service knowledge base, a help desk ticketing application,
and a breadth of digital and social channels for customer communication.
Knowledge product The Parature management solution provides content that can be easily created and
description delivered to agents and to customers across a range of communication channels.
Knowledge Via authoring using a WYSIWYG editor; via promotion from a solved ticket, a
creation completed chat, or an inbound email; or via import.
Knowledge Via a hierarchy of categories. Content can live in one or many categories, which can
organization be private or public.
Knowledge quality Via report (e.g., number of views, the number of deflections that the article
measurement and contributed to) and customer feedback. Content is optimized via gap reports,
evolution escalations to a ticket or chat, or via input from activity streams on content.
Knowledge Includes keyword search, augmented by stemming, stop words and relevant
retrieval weighting based on term density, location of matched terms, phrase match versus
partial match. Also supports guided resolution. Content cannot be federated.
Other vendor products Can be bundled with the Parature customer service solution and with Microsoft
that can be bundled Dynamics CRM.
with knowledge
Typical organizational Customer service
buyer
Pricing models Per agent, and included in the base MS Dynamics license price. Customers receive
1 million page views per month with their subscription, and additional page views are
available in increments.
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26
Moxie
Company Moxie anticipates customer needs and engages with digital channels to boost
description sales and build customer loyalty across devices.
Knowledge product Moxie knowledge is a core component of Moxies product suite and provides unified
description access to knowledge across the products channels and touchpoints.
Knowledge Via authoring in a web-based administration portal; via import from another format
creation such as PDF or Office file; via bulk import.
Knowledge Via knowledge base, category, or attribute.
organization
Knowledge quality Via ratings, feedback, and reports (including content usage and quality).
measurement and Uses reports and expiration date settings to optimize content.
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search; all words, any words, Boolean,
retrieval and exact match searches; guided resolution; federated search. The search engine
can index remote websites, file systems, databases, and SharePoint sites in addition
to the native knowledge-base content. Also supports faceted search to filter search
results by knowledge base, category, attribute, content type, and file type. Solution
Finders guide users to the correct answer in a question and answer format.
Other vendor products Usually bundled with Moxie Email and Live Chat.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Contact center, eBusiness
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per named agent
Customer-facing: per session, sold in blocks of 250K/year
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Salesforce
Company Salesforce delivers cloud CRM solutions. Salesforces Service Cloud, a key
description component of Salesforces CRM solution, delivers multichannel customer service
and support capabilities with deep mobile and social capabilities.
Knowledge product Salesforce Knowledge is a knowledge base that supports straightforward
description knowledge scenarios. It is typically deployed as part of a Service Cloud or
Community Cloud deployment and less often a Sales Cloud deployment.
Knowledge Via authoring in a portal; via promotion of case details, community posts, and
creation chatter conversations.
Knowledge Via hierarchical data categories that often map to product hierarchy.
organization
Knowledge quality Via user ratings, and feedback gathered in activity streams associated with a
measurement and solution. Reports are available via the AppExchange.
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search using natural language
retrieval processes such as tokenization, stemming, and stopword lists to deliver relevant
results. Salesforce does not support federated search or guided resolution flows.
Other vendor products Can be bundled with the Service Cloud and the Community Cloud.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Customer service
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent
Customer-facing: page views or logins for authenticated users
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Zendesk
Company Zendesk provides multichannel customer service and internal help desk solutions.
description
Knowledge product Zendesk knowledge is a straightforward knowledge base to support customer and
description agent FAQs.
Knowledge Zendesk does not include automated ways to create content.
creation
Knowledge Via a standard hierarchy.
organization
Knowledge quality Via user feedback and reports (e.g., knowledge base activity, community
measurement and engagement, and search behavior).
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search across the knowledge base and forums. Zendesk does not
retrieval support federated search or guided resolution flows.
Other vendor products Knowledge is part of Zendesks product suite.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Customer support, customer experience
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: per agent
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Pegasystems
Company Pegasystems delivers a process-driven CRM suite that leverages predictive analytdescription ics to drive next-best-action scenarios in sales, marketing, and customer service.
Knowledge product Pegasystems knowledge is used to deliver contextual content to agents and
description customers in next-best-action or structured support scenarios.
Knowledge Via knowledge workers who discover, harvest, tag, and categorize content.
creation
Knowledge Via context (e.g., use case, product type, service request, type of customer, intent).
organization
Knowledge quality Via utilization rates, user feedback, reports, and A/B testing.
measurement and
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search; federated search (e.g., LinkedIn,
retrieval YouTube, Wikipedia, Google Maps, etc.). Also supports guided resolution with
questions authored in a decision tree or decision table.
Other vendor products Knowledge is bundled with Pegasystems CRM suite products.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Customer service, marketing, sales
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: Free when bundled with the Pegasystems CRM suite or priced on
content views when purchased standalone.
Customer-facing: Free when bundled with the Pegasystems CRM suite or priced
on content views when purchased standalone.
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31
Verint
Company Verint provides solutions for customer engagement optimization; security
description intelligence; and fraud, risk, and compliance.
Knowledge product The Verint-Kana Knowledge Management solution is a core component of the
description Kana Enterprise product set. It delivers context-driven search results, clarifying
questions, and guided assistance within a service process to help agents and
customers pinpoint the right answer.
Knowledge Via authoring in a rich text editor using templates; or via import.
creation
Knowledge Via tag hierarchies (e.g., product, topic, channel, audience).
organization
Knowledge quality Via reuse, user ratings, feedback, and reports (content usage and engagement). Also
measurement and uses social insights and agent desktop analytics to identify knowledge gaps.
evolution
Knowledge Includes keyword search; natural language search, Boolean queries, or parametric
retrieval inputs; topic tree browsing; bookmarks; guided process flows with scripting. Users
can filter to determine which content source(s) to search within, including all external
content. Search results can be weighted and tuned.
Other vendor products Can be bundled with Kana Enterprise.
that can be bundled
with knowledge
Typical organizational Contact center, eBusiness
buyer
Pricing models Agent-facing: base platform price, plus a price per concurrent user
Customer-facing: number of unique web visitors to the website
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Recommendations
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33
Analyst Advisory
Supplemental Material
Companies Interviewed For This Report
[24]7
Moxie
Aptean
Mvine
Astute Solutions
nanorep
Bloomfire
Oracle
Coveo Solutions
Pegasystems
Creative Virtual
RightAnswers
eGain
Salesforce
Genesys
Transversal
Lithium Technologies
Verint
Microsoft Parature
Zendesk
MindTouch
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34
Endnotes
Source: Forresters North American Technographics Customer Experience Survey, 2013.
For more information on understanding how to improve your customer service strategy, see the Channel
Management: Core To Your Customer Service Strategy Forrester report.
For the first time in the history of our survey, respondents reported using the FAQ pages on a companys website more
than speaking with an agent over the phone. Web self-service use by US online adults increased from 67% in 2012 to
76% in 2014. See the Contact Centers Must Go Digital Or Die Forrester report.
Only asked to those who are significantly involved with their firms contact centers and whose firms have 20+
employees and 50+ seat contact centers. Source: Forresters Global Business Technographics Networks And
Telecommunications Survey, 2015.
Knowledge management is a software category that is growing in importance due to the quantifiable business value
it delivers. See the TechRadar For AD&D Pros: Contact Center Solutions For Customer Service, Q1 2015
Forrester report.
Kana Software acquired Ciboodle in July 2012, and it has been deeply integrating product lines since this acquisition.
Source: Kate Leggett, More Market Consolidation As KANA Software Buys Sword Ciboodle. Its A Sound Strategy,
But The Proof Will Be In The Execution, Kate Leggetts blog, July 10, 2012 (http://blogs.forrester.com/kate_
leggett/12-07-10-more_market_consolidation_as_kana_software_buys_sword_ciboodle_its_a_sound_strategy_but_
the_proof_wil).
Forrester has a best practice framework for knowledge management. See the Best Practices: Knowledge
Management For Customer Service Forrester report.
Cognitive systems listen, learn, and respond using natural language and symbolic reasoning (in precisely the way that
people learn: by seeing patterns, associating concepts, then recognizing and inferring). By comparing and linking
concepts and patterns across data and content, these systems provide more powerful insights and predictions. See
the Cognitive Engagement: A New Force Of Creative Destruction Forrester report.
KCS, or knowledge centered support, is a methodology to author and maintain knowledge. Source: Consortium for
Service Innovation (http://www.serviceinnovation.org).
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